Remote Server shell command

[Joel Wiseheart]

First, the question: Is there a way to use Access VBA to
run a command line program on a remote server?

Here's the situation: I have a new Access 2002 client app
that will be distributed to many PC's, with the back-end
data stored in a different .mdb file on a remote server.

There is a utility called TablePro, that can extract data
from our 'SAP' ERP system to an Access .mdb file (That's
why I'm using .mdb's and DAO instead of SQL and ADO). The
licensed copy of it is on the server.

I need to run TablePro through the command line, which
has command line parameters to adjust the WHERE clause of
the particular data extraction profile to be run. For
example:

Shell ("C:\Program
Files\WinShuttle\TablePro\TablePro.exe " _
& "233, {W1} = 12345678"

The '233' is the TablePro "profile number," and
the '{W1}' is used to pass criteria to the profile WHERE
clause.

So, if the client .mdb file is on a client PC, is there a
way to run the TablePro.exe file on the remote server
from the client?

Thanks!

 

[John Nurick]

Hi Joel,

I've never tried this myself but AFAIK you use WMI, Windows Management
Instrumentation, which is part of the Windows scripting facilities and
can therefore be used from VBA.

Make sure, however, that your TablePro licence covers this "server-side"
use.

 

[Dan Artuso]

Hi,
You can look into using psexec.
It's a command line tool used to run an executable on a remote PC.
Of course you need the admin credentials to run it, but you'd need those
anyway
to do anything on a remote server.

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/psexec.shtml

From within your local db, just Shell out to psexec.

HTH
Dan Artuso, MVP

 

[Joel Wiseheart]

This works perfectly! And yes, I have admin rights...

Thanks!